Snowball fights, health, safety and compensation
 

The wife was on a rant while watching daytime TV. A headmaster was being interviewed by Piers Morgan because he banned snowball fights. His logic. Children who come in cold, soaking wet, possibly agitated are not prepared for the lesson or to learn. He touched very briefly on the fact that should some pupil put a stone or grit in a snowball then a pupil may get injured and the school ergo him could be sued by an angry parent.
Ok first point. When I and I am sure most of you were at school snow ball fighting was mandatory. If you didn't go into class cold and wet desperately fighting for radiator space to dry your clothes well it just wasn't a snowy day at school. So whats changed? Health and Safety Executive everyone says and that was the line Piers was trying to go down. A pal of mine works for the HSE. He often says that HSE legislation is good legislation but has been hijacked by anyone in particular schools who hide behind it because of the compensation culture that now exists in the UK. And to be honest I would agree with that. This country is full of ambulance chasing solicitors looking to represent people who want to sue someone. My grandsons sports day was cancelled last year by the headteacher because it rained! Rained ! and her fear. Someone may slip on the wet grass and sue the school. Its time we let the kids get cold and wet, dry their coats on radiators and slip on the grass. In my day we called that a slide tackle.

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I do not remember any day in my school life when the school closed because of the weather
I remember the boiler breaking down at school in the middle of Winter...did they send us home?
What a stupid question...of course they didn't....they made us sit in our coats.
I can remember doing cross country running in the middle of winter...in gym knickers and lightweight plimsolls, I remember slipping and falling in the stream that dissected Priestley Clough(which was where our run took us)....I can remember the games mistress telling us we all had to get showered ...the water was cold.

Did any of this do me any harm?
I can't say that it did.
We do not give the children a chance to have the kind of experiences in life that will help them to grow, be more rounded individuals...this has got to be detrimental to them...Far more so than our (unwelcome, but valuable) experiences did.

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this head teacher had a different response ....

Pupils versus teachers snowball fight - BBC News

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Cold showers after a cross country run in winter. Character building either that or the boiler was broke for 5 years.

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There were no hot showers at King George's playing fields back then.
They were cold in summer and winter.

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I think he has the right outlook.

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Trouble today is theres too many "WIMPS" in society, simple as.:rolleyes:

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I must admit that when I was at Rhyddings 1972-77 in summer we had a choice of Cross Country Running or Cricket and in winter it was Cross Country Running or Football. As I was rubbish at both Cricket and Football I always ended up doing Cross Country and there was no change in PE Kit during winter or summer. Whilst it didn't do me any harm, it did put me off sports completely and utterly until this day.

I don't remember schools ever closing due to bad weather, but then almost everyone walked to school, none of the this namby-pamby driven to school in a 4x4... and snowball fights were almost obligatory when it did snow

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I was rubbish at cross country running too, but my best friend was good and she used to drag me along with her.
A lot of the girls would stop and have a fag behind farmer Nelson's barn otherwise I think I would have been last.
I was (with Pat's encouragement) usually in the first ten back to base.
The games mistress used to take binoculars so that she knew who had taken a long time behind the barn...she would smell their breath for the smell of ciggies and they would have to be outside the Headmasters office the next morning.
Cross country running was always the last lesson on a Wednesday...and it put me off all sport too...I hated it.

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Navy blue knickers and blue legs never were a good look.

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I don't know about the navy blue knickers. being a boy on these cross country runnings, but we did get timed, so if you took longer than expected you had to do the whole thing again.... I hated sports of any kind at school and still do

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Agree entirely on what has been said so far.
I remember vividly having snowball “fights” in the playground at Woodnook St Marys between 1949 and 1952, with the headmaster Mr. Barton, or the teacher Mr. Pickles encouraging us on. The same afterwards at Woodnook Secondary school between 1953 and 1958.
Cheers
Philip Kenyon

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loved football and cricket at school but cross country running put me off any form of athletics for ever. a good knowledge of bus times and a tanner in your hand did help though. plus i was never caught on my bus journey route 69 to blackley.

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there is a school near to me called foxhill junior schoo which must be one of the highest schools in west yorkshire. its well above queensbury which is between halifax and bradford. it has something in common with the windmill theatre. the headmistress there prides herself in the fact that it never closes.

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You guys need to stop living in the past - things have moved on, some maybe not for the better but most are as far as I can see. If people these days are what you call wimps then maybe thats because the older generations have brough them up that way - im looking at you. Put the daily mail down and stop believing all the nonsense. Its like the monty python yorkshiremen sketch on this forum sometimes.

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people are certainly not all wimps by any means but if you think all this mamby pamby way of life that some want, health and safety for everything, one food scare after another, drug addiction, vandalism, animal cruelty increasing are your green and promised land i hope you enjoy it. in the past things were not all that rosy but most were better than young and old have to suffer nowadays. try the suicide rate at present as well.

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Who died and left you king of opinions?
If you do not like what you are reading then do not stay...you can move, you are not a tree.
What 'nonsense' are we believing?

I certainly did not bring my child up to be a wimp. I gave her the experiences that we had as children...well apart from brothers.

Yes, times have moved on...they always do...but somewhere along the line common sense got lost or thrown away.

By preventing children to take a balanced risk we are not allowing them to form good strategies for life in the big bad world out there. For the dangers that they might meet.
Perhaps your life was devoid of fun and adventure(if it was, then I pity you)...mine wasn't.
I played out, I climbed trees, I ate wild berries straight off the bush, I walked miles with my brothers, we fished in streams, we built dens, we had snowball fights, we sledged on tin trays, we collected wood and built bonfires....stood on street corners collecting pennies for the guy.
In general, had a very rich and rewarding childhood without the interference of the nanny state.
So sad that todays children do not get these opportunities...they sit in front of screens and that is how they get their fun..how sad is that?

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You are not in a position to make this judgement if you did not live in the days we are discussing....you cannot really know anything at all about the past that we lived in.
You think most things are better..as far as you can see.

Maybe you should visit Specsavers....and stop swallowing whole the pap that government agencies feed you.

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Well as far as i'm concerned you seem like one of em.:rolleyes:

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A lot of things are better but for my money a lot of things are much worse. One of my grandsons spends so much time on a game console he looks like a vampire. Sunlight would kill him. At his age I was in the scouts (Christ Church ) and like most of our generation spent most of my waking hours outdoors. That why this country has more fat kids (Oo er I'm a fattist) Also I was fit and healthy, ate proper food, played a lot of sport which I loved, climbed trees, fell in Priestly Clough, built rope swings, skinned my knees, and had a good fun child hood. It was fun healthy and innocent. I thought Manuel Labour was a Mexican bandit and Wan King was a city in China. Not so today. As for the generation that brought them up well unfortunately a lot of government establishments were staffed/infiltrated by key people in the 60's and 70's who had a very nanny state approach to raising kids and that under His Tonyness only got worse. This is a great country but sadly it is the worst for being a nanny state where you can do wrong and the first thing that happens is their is a queue of people lining up to tell you its not your fault someone else is to blame and while were at it have some compensation. Anyway have to go back tu shoe box in road.

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Ive just logged back on for the sake of Russthemink. Here is a case study for you Russ.
1974 I'm playing rugby for the school. Its cold wet and muddy. I'm the ball carrier, go into a tackle, and offload the ball game moves on. Pick myself up run on. Whistle goes. I'm blood subbed. My right incisor tooth has been knocked out in the tackle. ( Never found it ) spent five minutes on the touch line biting on cotton wool then back on. We lost by the way. After the match got the bus home alone. Blackburn to Accy. Got home. Mum is annoyed because my good looks have been spoilt, Dad gets home "should have got lower in the tackle son" End of. Fast forward same incident today.
I would have been taken off and a teacher would have taken me to A and E.
Having been assessed I would be offered trauma counselling.
The referee would be suspended as would the sports coach. The lad who tackled me would be arrested for assault.
An ambulance chasing parasite would contact my parents offering to sue the school for letting me play without a gum shield, putting me in harms way without adequate protection, and not calling a halt to the game to allow me to find my tooth. They would also seek huge compensation for my life changing facial disfigurement. My parents would be investigated by social services for failing to provide a gum shield and I may be taken into care because of their neglect. The school would spend thousands defending its actions but would be deprived of the sports coach until the issue was resolved several years later.
Do I still sound like the Monty Python sketch Russ?

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Big Joe....look at your signature.
It says it all in respect of the comment by this member.
The other thing to note is that he has been here since 2010 and he has posted 17 posts.

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His last post before the one on this was Nov 2013, yet comments on whats posted on the forum.:D:D:D:D:D:D:D his perogative, but if everyone was like him there wouldn't be a forum.

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Might have something to do with the Minkies blaze of red where his reputation is concerned (looking at his public profile page).

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Yes, I spotted that but thought i would not mention it.
Not exactly an asset to the forum...except, if I am devil's advocate, it HAS provoked a healthy response.

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No, it's not, myself, sister and brother all walked to and from school everyday, from Lonsdale St to Rhyddings School whatever the weather (and my Dad was one of the few people on our street that actually had a car). I don't ever remember the school closing due to bad weather. No bloody 4x4's either.

Teachers could actually discipline kids, I remember there was a woodwork teacher who had a bat with Ouch written in chalk...

If you did something wrong and were caught by someone they gave you a clip round the lughole and dragged you off to your parents and you'd get the same again.

We actually had friends and you went around to their house to get them to play out (and not talking to them on mobile phones via Facebook). Your dad would help you make trolleys and we would fly down Exchange St with no brakes and not have to worry about cars getting in the way.

In the summer months we would be out from early morning until it got dark, if you fell and hurt yourself, it's just how it was - there was no ambulance chasing/compensation culture then.

I'm sure this will be familiar to anyone of a certain age....

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think that sums up most of our childhoods. saturday morning if there wasn,t a school match consisted about 12 of us playing football in the local rec. rain, snow and occasionally shine. was repeated after the match we went too in autumn after the game. managed to keep slim without the need of poncy diets. plenty of fish and chips and sugry drinks for all. funny when i still meet up with some of these lads we do not look much different apart from looking older. must have done something right then.

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As the song goes, "yes I remember it well"; think yourself lucky Margaret, I and many other lads had to do the same as the lasses whilst under the mean and watchful gaze of Milton Suthers; he did treat everyone equally though, the piece of rubber V belt that he used in place of a cane brought on the ritual of not daring to cry or even sniffle in front of your class mates.
After saying the above, I still believe that corporal punishment should never have been banded; used without malice it did no harm.

Your's Taddy.

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Banded should have read Banned

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agree about not banning corporate punishment if you broke school and home rules as it was the only thing that got us all in line, but it was used a bit too frequently at my junior school if you made a mess of your classwork. not everyone was good at sums or english and did feel a bit sorry for some who just could not do what was asked.

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Thanks for your comments everyone. I would just like to say having spent so much time away its good to hear people to talk about places I remember and use phrases I don't here anywhere else. Trolleys. The trick was a good set of pram wheels. Where I live now they call them boggies which in red rose country is something that come out of your nose.
Ryewolf do you remember Doc Harbinson on Lonsdale Street. He was our family GP in the days when GPs knew your family and had real time to talk to their patients.

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We always called them Trolleys, though a friend who lived in Great Harwood did call them Bogies, as you say a bogey came out your nose...

I don't remember a Doc Harbinson on Lonsdale Street and if I remember correctly our doctor was up near Church (The Commercial Pub) near Alleytroyds when that junction of Blackburn Road used to be terraced houses and there was a lodge between Lodge View and Alleytroyds

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I remember Dr Harbinson...but only vaguely.
Our Doctor was Doctors Chesney, I can't remember the husband's name but his wife was Doctor Grace Chesney.
He used to do his home visits on horseback.
I can remember him visiting my Ma after the birth of one of the boys(a home birth) and he tied his horse to the lamp post.
When they retired the practice was taken over by Dr Fenton.

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Dr Harbinson's surgery was on the corner of Newark St-Blackburn Rd.

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Margaret, am I right in saying that Dr Grace Chesney was killed in a horse riding accident?

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[QUOTE=monkey hanger;1209493]My younger son used to be a peripatetic music teacher in Bradford. A few years ago he had a real struggle to get to Foxhill with no end of roads closed by snow. He expected to get some praise for getting through but the Head told him off and complained to the office that he was late.

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It was Dr. Grace Chesney's Husband (like Margaret forgot his first name, maybe it will come back to me sometime soon) who was killed by a riding accident. Dr. Grace Chesney still ran the surgery with Dr. Fenton untill 1963, after that I don't really know.

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Thanks for that, I can vaguely remember something about it.

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After Doctor Fenton, the practice was taken over by husband and wife GP's
Drs Karim....well that is my recollection, but if someone else remembers it differently.
I thought that Dr Fenton went on longer than 1963... but again I am happy to be corrected.

I had moved to Clayton In 1966 and I have to say that after being looked after by Dr Fenton and Doctors Chesney, the new GP's were not(in my opinion) very good.
And it was Doctor Grace's husband who was killed in a horse riding accident.

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I will have to google map Dr Harbies place. I genuinely thought it was Lonsdale Street but having been away so long I will bow to superior local knowledge. Last time I went back we drove along Blackburn Road into Accy. Couldn't believe how much it had all changed especially around the site of the old boys grammer school and sacred heart church. But that's progress. I truly believe though we grew up at a great time. As I said before childhood was healthy innocent and fun. There is a lot of pressure put on young kids now to conform and if the don't well they get cyber bullied.

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[QUOTE=Big Joe;1209584 I truly believe though we grew up at a great time. As I said before childhood was healthy innocent and fun. There is a lot of pressure put on young kids now to conform and if the don't well they get cyber bullied.[/QUOTE]

totally agree joe. those who were kids after the 2nd world war have never had it so good. pre war poverty and mass unemployment for your old man was over. rationing did exist but kids never noticed even if your mam did, but there was always a good meal on the table. you could basically play anywhere and old bomb sites provided us with hide and seek as well as cut knees but none lads or lasses bothered. my parents use to moan about the freedom we had up to their generation. was probably correct but we had much more than the present one with all the fears correct or not including in modern parenting.

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there was an article on the news a few months ago about the post war births and how we benefited from parents who bought their own homes and how we benefited from good employment and pension schemes. I'm not a sociologist but I wouldn't argue with that.

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I think many miss the point that while we did buy our own homes, we did not get them given to us....that wages were low, mortgage rates were high and to be able to afford our own homes we made sacrifices.

We made do with second hand furniture, carpets, (not wall to wall carpets, more like big rugs)nothing matched.(this was certainly so in my case). We bought stuff at Jumble sales, took stuff from family and friends.

We did not have holidays abroad....we did not have many nights out.
I can remember during the early years of my marriage having to choose between a newish wardrobe and a weeks holiday in a guest house in Southport...the wardrobe won.

I can also remember having too much week at the end of the money....making clothes for my daughter from my own dresses...cut up and hand sewn.
I can remember paying our electric bill with money that was sent to me for my 21st birthday present.
So anyone who thinks we had it easy, can have another think.

It was 1980 before I got to see foreign shores....I was thirty three years old and had worked from being 15 with just a year off when I had my daughter.
I had studied and qualified as a registered nurse...this also meant making sacrifices.

Today, it appears that those young folk who think we had it made want nights out, mobile phones which cost nearly as much as my house, foreign holidays....they don't save, they don't see the point.

We did this so that we could secure a roof over our heads

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Thats it in a nutshell Sacrifices had to be made, i think many these days don't know the meaning of the word, they want everything NOW.:rolleyes:

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only time our parents saved was to buy something. same with me as i have never been one to get excited about looking at my bank balance.

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Me neither, but I never did rely on credit...so anything that you wanted(that included the deposit for a house) had to be saved for.
I am still very suspicious of credit...and do not use it at all.
Prefer to pay my way...if i can't pay, then I don't go.
It the safest way to ensure that you do not get into financial difficulties...it is a useful lesson to learn...you cannot have what you cannot afford.

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When i first got wed, we did buy many second hand items, no way could we afford NEW,Though we did get 1 thing on H.P.- a gas cooker, we could not find a decent second hand one, and late wife was a bit wary over summat gas that didn't look right,

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When I first passed my driving test in 1977 my first car was a 1968 Austin 1300 which I bought for 80 quid. I was so pleased with it even though it was way past its best before date, these days as young people pass their test they often seem to want a brand new car straight away. I got my first brand new car in 2006. I wonder if we appreciated things a lot more then?
Mark

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I think you do value the things that you have had to work hard and save for.
Having to save teaches you the value of money.

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It seems some folk "Know the price of everything, but the cost of nothing", so the thought of living within your means is seen as a rather strange prospect & then they wonder why they can't make ends meet & the bailiffs & repo men are banging at their door.

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[QUOTE=Mark2009;1209664]When I first passed my driving test in 1977 my first car was a 1968 Austin 1300 which I bought for 80 quid. I was so pleased with it even though it was way past its best before date, these days as young people pass their test they often seem to want a brand new car straight away. I

passed my test in 1966. first car was a ford anglia 100e. cost me 25 quid which i saved up for. saved up again for 12 months and got a pre war lagonda my pride and joy for 4 years. looking at the new drivers around me its all new cars for em and will still be paying for em well after the time they get bored. live now pay later is the motto.

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Passed my test in 77. I already had a car which I didn't drive mmmmm! You never forget your first car. In my case it was a Gold Vauxhall Viva 4 door 1300 complete with bald tyres and an appearance best described as a series of holes held together with small amounts of bodywork. It was so old it was mentioned in the bible along with Moses motorcycle.
"And the roar of Moses Triumph was heard throughout the land".

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[QUOTE=Big Joe;1209703 You never forget your first car. In my case it was a Gold Vauxhall Viva 4 door 1300 complete with bald tyres and an appearance best described as a series of holes held together with small amounts of bodywork.

good old days joe. you got quite good in the use of body filler and spray cans back in those days. you thought you,d done a good job until it rained and the rust came back again.

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Body filler!!! I should have bought shares in companies that made it. I would have been laughing all the way to the bank now.

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i can still smell it joe and see the little pink hardener coming out of the little tube. want to be buried with a packet as they might have 60,s fords and vauxhalls in any after life.

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Ah yes the hardner. Too much and it went off before you got it on or didnt set for a week. Lol